Hi NetBehaviourists,
The 1st 'digest/post' today of interesting subjects on the Internet that
I have been finding and reading about...
marc
-------------------->
Cloned Beef: It's What's For Dinner.
Irina Polejaeva has the secret to the perfect steak, but is America
ready for her recipe?
What if you could carve off a chunk of the most succulent slab of steak
you’ve ever eaten, clone a bull from it, then produce weeks of
identically delectable dinners? Irina Polejaeva, chief embryologist at
ViaGen, a livestock-cloning lab in Austin, Texas, aims to bring cloned
beef to the American dinner table within the next few years. Since 2005,
ViaGen has cloned half a dozen cows from strips of beef, a procedure
that enables the company to test the quality of the meat before bringing
it back to life. Clones would head to a breeder, and their offspring
would go into a chain of feedlots, slaughterhouses and, finally, your
burger. But first, the Food and Drug Administration must rule on the
safety of cloned meat, a decision that could make or break the most
controversial idea in the food industry since the transgenic tomato.
more...
http://linkme2.net/9l
-------------------->
Dangerous Patent Law Ruling Threatens Free and Open Source Software.
EFF Asks Supreme Court to Protect Open Source Innovation
San Francisco - The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has asked the
United States Supreme Court to overturn a dangerous patent law ruling
that could pose a serious threat to Free and Open Source Software projects.
In a recent decision, the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed its
own "suggestion test" as the main method for determining when a patent
should be found obvious over knowledge in the public domain. Under this
test, even the most obvious incremental advances and add-ons can be
patented unless the Patent Office or a defendant in court produces a
document that shows someone else suggested it prior to the patent being
filed.
"The Federal Circuit's suggestion test forces litigants to search
through reams of technical papers for a document in which someone,
somewhere, bothers to state the obvious," said EFF Staff Attorney
Corynne McSherry, who co-authored the amicus brief. "This is inefficient
and burdensome, and contrary to the principles, policies, and standards
the Supreme Court has upheld."
In its amicus brief filed Tuesday, EFF shows how this "suggestion test"
has led to a massive surge in bogus patenting, especially in software.
These bad patents then become weapons against legitimate innovators --
especially those working on Free and Open Source Software projects.
"Free and Open Source Software projects have become an integral part of
the software industry and our nation's economy," said EFF Staff Attorney
Jason Schultz, a co-author of the brief. "They often lack the resources
or formal documentation to fight against bogus patents under the
suggestion test, so it is principally important that the Supreme Court
set the appropriate standard to prevent the approval of bogus patents."
The case, KSR International Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., and Technology
Holding Co., is scheduled for oral argument in front the Supreme Court
this fall.
For the full amicus brief:
http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/KSR_v_Teleflex/ksr_amicus.pdf
more...
-------------------->
Maybe we don't need embryonic stem cells after all
Embryonic stem cells (ESCs) have the potential to develop into any
tissue, and thus hold promise for repair of damaged organs. Part of that
potential comes from being a perfect tissue match to the person in need
of repair, but this assumes that ESCs can be made from adults, a process
that currently requires using a process that's disturbingly close to
human cloning. The alternatives, however, are also problematic. Human
ESCs exist, but they will not be perfect matches to patients, and there
are restrictions on working with them while using government funding and
some ethical concerns regarding their creation. Although adult stem
cells exist, they are partly specified, and may not be able to form
every tissue that needs repair. In addition, some adult stem cells exist
in small populations that reside in hard-to-reach locations—nobody's
going to dig around in the heart or interior of the brain of a patient
in order to pull out a few stem cells.
more...
http://arstechnica.com/journals/science.ars/2006/8/25/5112
-------------------->
Spammers manipulate stock markets.
Spam messages that tout stocks and shares can have real effects on the
markets, a study suggests. E-mails typically promote penny shares in the
hope of convincing people to buy into a company to raise its price.
People who respond to the "pump and dump" scam can lose 8% of their
investment in two days.
Conversely, the spammers who buy low-priced stock before sending the
e-mails, typically see a return of between 4.9% and 6% when they sell.
The study recently published on the Social Science Research Network say
their conclusions prove the hypothesis that spammers "buy low and spam
high".
The researchers say that approximately 730 million spam e-mails are sent
every week, 15% of which tout stocks. Other estimates of spam volumes
are far higher.
more...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5284618.stm
_______________________________________________
NetBehaviour mailing list
NetBehaviour@netbehaviour.org
http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour
